Running a forum is cheap and with the cloud, maintaining it is cheap these days. Keeping thw malware and stuff off is harder but can be done with partners can be fairly inexpencive. This site (which I said before) will at some point hold no value becaue they never allowed direct posts of pictures which would have been permanitly on the site instead of disapearing when an accout or company disapeared. Now this used to be expencive but not any more.
By now, it should be obvious to all of us that Kalmbach has no interest in upgrading the forum software. Not after all of these years.
I am sure that at one time Kalmbach had an interest, probably economic, in starting and maintaining the forum. But whatever that interest was no longer exists.
So, it has assigned a few employees to monitor the various forums including this one for signs of troublemakers, and that is about it.
Rich
Alton Junction
So, if this forum does eventually succumb and slip beneath the waves. Where do you all think you will end up? There is a lot of other model railroading forums out there. Something tells me we won't get any warning when the lights go out here.
Brent
"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."
BATMAN So, if this forum does eventually succumb and slip beneath the waves. Where do you all think you will end up? There is a lot of other model railroading forums out there. Something tells me we won't get any warning when the lights go out here.
I don't believe that Kalmbach would shut down the forum without fair warning. But, the day may come when the software completely fails, and all modes of communication are lost.
BATMANWhere do you all think you will end up?
I'll probably just head on down the street to a few others that I'm a member of, but don't post much. I suppose I better not name them here.
I've also joined the group that Wayne helped start, which makes 6, including this one. Way more than I have time to be active in.
I'm in a few FB groups as well, which works fine, sometime you need to step over the BS, but it's all good.
Mike.
My You Tube
richhotrain By now, it should be obvious to all of us that Kalmbach has no interest in upgrading the forum software. Not after all of these years. I am sure that at one time Kalmbach had an interest, probably economic, in starting and maintaining the forum. But whatever that interest was no longer exists. So, it has assigned a few employees to monitor the various forums including this one for signs of troublemakers, and that is about it. Rich
Well, you might be right. But they sure do spend some effort selling the ad space on it.....
The tractor forum I mentioned is user owned, sells lots of ads, but us "owners" who pay small subscription fee don't see the ads.
Sheldon
It was explained several years ago that Kalmbach did not make any money on the forum. The ads barely covered the expenses.
It was also explained that quite a bit fewer than half of the forum members actually subscribed to the magazines.
I can understand why there is not a lot of encouragement for Kalmbach to spend any money upgrading it.
York1 John
ATLANTIC CENTRALBut they sure do spend some effort selling the ad space on it.....
They certainly don't spend too much on it because I never see any ads.
maxman ATLANTIC CENTRAL But they sure do spend some effort selling the ad space on it..... They certainly don't spend too much on it because I never see any ads.
ATLANTIC CENTRAL But they sure do spend some effort selling the ad space on it.....
Well, this forum is the only place I go on the web where an ad blocker would be of any value - so I don't bother. You might be surprised to find out how limited my use of the web is.
True - nobodys time is free. However, MR staff are already on a payroll. All they need to do is type up their site. But as said, they arent programmers. That is how you get your site for nothing! Do it yourself!
I do my sites for free! I dont charge myself. So yes, this site could be written for no extra cost if I worked for MR (except my normal pay but id be getting that anyway if I worked for them doing normal daily MR stuff).
(Disclaimer: I do not program anything after Win7. I am a white hat, not a black hat and therefore i do not write code to steal, track, or otherwise anything which you find common place today - this is why i dont get asked!! Anything with a .com following its name is stealing something these days! I dont have anything to do with that and wont - thus retired from puter work after 40+ years as an IT professional.)
Yes, it will be a sad day when this site does go down. Not everyone subscribes to using forums found on the popular social diseases (you call it social media, but its a disease).
Like I said, be happy we have what we have now. Its free, its open to public, it hasnt succommed to too much advertising (stealing), and it still works to a degree we can atleast talk to each other (for now) via threads.
We can still share ideas, photos, links, etc. Yes it could be better, but the alternatives are worse. Far worse!
While I dont always agree with what MR does, I am thankful we have what we have. We all should be!
PMR
Just as a couple of comments:
You can relatively easily, if not directly of course, Google up the post-2019 grand strategy at "Kalmbach Media" to remake the enthusiast-magazine market. A very key part of that (and I'll let you do the primary research and just paraphrase some of the claimed approaches) was the frankly massive exploitation of certain, as they put it, enthusiast communities that they thought they, and only they, had a distinctively-competent 'lock' on (and who had "raving-fan" style loyalty to the brand)... unsurprisingly, the forum package was touted as an important example of this. And this, to me, explained the dancing ads, the contracting margins on phones, the broken content freezing the browser because parts of the very complex back-end marketing code broke (for all I know, a certain someone is still locked out with one of these as the -- ridiculously easy to address, even with entering a small amount of fake data, but in all these years yet unaddressed -- error message. Note all the targeted ads for various Kalmbach-related store sales, unlimited content that seldom gets timely updated, etc. Even the Taligent back end has... apparently... been replaced by some other insanely-complicated but uncredited and unrequested marketing package that, for all I know, is doing exactly what Kalmbach proposed in 2019 and 'opening opportunities' for 'trusted venture partners' to access this community's registered access, of course for 'enthusiast opportunities' we FRNs would surely and unquestionably snap at.
Remember that the forum software is and was a PACKAGE. It was sold as code-in-a-can for people with limited 'programming experience' or whatever to configure and control with a dashboard of built-in options and features, some of which Kalmbach has intentionally toggled over the years (for example, why we have a 'friends' feature but no longer a 'foes') While I can't speaki for the congeries of hooks and replaced calls involved first in the Taligent debacle and now with whatever-it-is they're running (you can find out; I don't really care enough even for free) it almost goes without saying that their LEGACY code to run the forum features ought to be easily restored to re-enable the key features that are broken, and with only a little more effort adapted to suit all the modern security enhancements that have broken so much browser-specific "functionality" that lazy implementers don't or can't comprehend.
You will recall that we were promised... over and over and over... that we'd get at least a bare-bones functional forum renovation as part of 'stage three' of the Grand Kalmbach Media Reinvention. We are still owed that, morally, and while of course I remain grateful that we still have any functionality that works at all, I have no particular respect for the post-coup survivors who still, kinda-sorta, are keeping our part of the marketing running so extensively.
BATMANSo, if this forum does eventually succumb and slip beneath the waves. Where do you all think you will end up?
I think it will be a quick dive, with a week or two notice. The failure to adhere to their promises is "fool me once: shame on you, fool me twice: shame on me. Now I know their priority in fixing the forum.
I don't actually know our alternatives. There is doc's site and an internet mag site, what else is out there? The groups I belong to are sort of niche, but woe to anyone who asks any other question about MR.
I expect this entire thread to disappear Monday morning.
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
BigDaddyThere is doc's site
Ya, I joined Doc Waynes in 2016. I know Bear and a few others are there. I really like that forum except for the fact it is pretty slow. Maybe if we all walk over there when this one crashes, things will pick up. I also hang out on another one that is quite busy and has good threads.
BATMANYa, I joined Doc Waynes in 2016. I know Bear and a few others are there.
"One difference between pessimists and optimists is that while pessimists are more often right, optimists have far more fun."
mbinsewiI'll probably just head on down the street to a few others that I'm a member of, but don't post much.
I am a single forum guy.
Before I landed here, I was on Warseer for years. Before that I was on the Pokemon Tournament Administrators forum.
If this one was to go away, I would probably just start posting on the photography forum where I have been lurking for a long time. Maybe those guys can give me some good pointers.
All that said... This forum has BY FAR been the most beneficial for me. I have met real world friends and had experiences I could never get anywhere else.
This forum is a treasure. I hope Kalmbach Media can see that and breathe new life into it.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
SeeYou190This forum has BY FAR been the most beneficial for me. I have met real world friends and had experiences I could never get anywhere else. This forum is a treasure. I hope Kalmbach Media can see that and breathe new life into it.
Mike
SeeYou190I am a single forum guy.
I've gotten to be that, as I spend less and less time in any forum I'm in, including 3 different tractor forums, my favorite is the Simplicity Tractor group, SimpleTractors.
I used to be able to keep busy in here, participating in many different topics and idea exchanges, but that seems to have quieted way done the last couple of years.
This forum was where I started. I started lurking about 2008-09 than joined 2010 when I started building my current layout.
I guess one of the good things, is that you can still Google different topics, and if it was discussed in here, it will show up on your search.
If needed, I'll probably settle into MRH for model railroading.
I do hate to see this forum shrival up and die, but with less parts of it working, I'm not too optimistic abouts it's future.
SeeYou190 All that said... This forum has BY FAR been the most beneficial for me. I have met real world friends and had experiences I could never get anywhere else. This forum is a treasure. I hope Kalmbach Media can see that and breathe new life into it.
In my opinion, not only can even an obsolescent-type forum community foster Kalmbach Media's bottom line at least as effectively as anticipated in 2019, many of the actual prospective tie-ins and cross-marketing, if done with even a modicum of skill and intelligence, would likely be, or have been, supported by the community membership.
Unsurprisingly, just as with the /neo/ disaster that destroyed Yahoo Groups, ignorant arrogance combined with technological ineptness has made the Forums increasingly a self-fulfilling prophecy regarding effective 'community monetization' beyond exploitation with intrusive and often defective ad feeds and pop-ups. That, of course, is Kalmbach's game to lose... but there are so many ways that even simple work could improve what's, both literally and figuratively, progressively turning the forums off.
What we see here is a plan gone wrong. They are a magazine and when that market started dying, they looked for other things, which is great except they really failed at it. They made key mistakes in the begining and would not admit it and fix so the proublem got worse. Most of you don't know but a buggy whip manufacture is a major player still in manufacturing (they just don't sell many buggy whips, mostly to the movie industry because they saw the end coming and looked elseware). Now model railroading is not dying but it is changing, just like the rest of the world. Magazines in paper form are pretty well dead now along with newspapers.
mbinsewiIf needed, I'll probably settle into MRH for model railroading.
I am spending a lot more time there these days, there are a lot of familiar names there as well. MRH reminds me of what this forum used to be like.
rrebellMagazines in paper form are pretty well dead now along with newspapers.
Okay, I've had about enough of this stuff.
I read the "paper" paper, and I read the "paper" magazines.
I don't enjoy reading anything on line.
So you speak for yourself, not for me.
I joined this forum because I may learn something from it, and once in awhile maybe help out with an answer
Yes there are disappointing issues that appear to be out of our control. Continual harping on those issues is not going to make them improve.
However, the thing that irks me the most are the non-magazine subscribers who freeload and then complain that the free product is not to their satisfaction.
[quote user="BATMAN"]
I agree, I read both MR and MRH. Cut and paste more threads from the other forum into a word document for easy access.
richhotrain I don't believe that Kalmbach is that utilitarian. And why should it be? Rather than promote social interaction, Kalmbach has an economic interest in promoting its product line. This forum doesn't seem to fully support that economic interest. Rich
I don't believe that Kalmbach is that utilitarian. And why should it be? Rather than promote social interaction, Kalmbach has an economic interest in promoting its product line. This forum doesn't seem to fully support that economic interest.
Seriously, though, what is Kalmbach's product line, now and into the future? Is it a planned and continuing dedication to print media, or are they seeing the continued eroision of print in favor of online content?
Frankly, I like the magazine, and i see the monetization of online content as a negative that will die slowly as the subscriber base realizes that a poorly-run website is just as bad as a poorly-run forum.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
maxmanHowever, the thing that irks me the most are the non-magazine subscribers who freeload and then complain that the free product is not to their satisfaction.
This goes for me, too.
I was very surprised to see how many people did not subscribe to the magazines, yet took time on the free forum to complain about Kalmbach.
I will join several others here in saying that this forum, with all its faults, is still my favorite model railroading forum. Even though I don't know any of the posters personally, I feel like I'm with a bunch of friends when I'm here.
I've been a subscriber of the mag, and the archives for many years, the last 2 or 3 years, a digital subscription is now part of it all.
Actually, I've never checked, but I don't think you can subscribe to the mag, without the digital as being part of it.
The print mag used to be a subscription by itself, and you added on what you wanted, as the availiable menu changed.
I occasionally read the MRH forums, and I have a hard time finding threads about people's health issues or what they're eating today. Can't find the "kids these days" threads either.
The MRH forums are about model railroading. This forum has become a Facebook substitute.
I subscribe to multiple railrad related magazines, and try to buy modelling products from advertisers in those magazines. I don't do eBay or discount sites. Yes, I probably pay more. To me it's worth it to support the model railroad industry.
I also read a couple of magazines from the UK. The amount of advertising, and thus the number of articles, is simply amazing compared to US publications.
mbinsewi I've been a subscriber of the mag, and the archives for many years, the last 2 or 3 years, a digital subscription is now part of it all. Actually, I've never checked, but I don't think you can subscribe to the mag, without the digital as being part of it. The print mag used to be a subscription by itself, and you added on what you wanted, as the availiable menu changed. Mike.
You can, I still have just the print magazine and the archives.
I will post a one-time comment to this thread. I just attempted, for the umpteenth time, to start a conversation with one of you. It's a member with whom I have no off-forum history, so I need to initiate the discussion/PM. No dice on MS Edge browser. Tried Chrome, same thing, doesn't allow me to type in the ever-expanding text box. If this had been an entire week...NO..and entire month with this problem, I would have had some hope of relief in the next few days, a week at most. However, it has been over four years at this point. I don't know what message that suggests to you, Dear Reader, but it tells me that this forum has a very low quality, priority, and import to our hosts. Why? Because those of us who frequent this forum comprise less than 10% of the subscribers and contributors to the magazine. It's really that simple. Meanwhile, there are four other fora I go to daily that provide at least some semblance of caring to provide a forum service if they bother to keep the managing servers running at all.
Can I also add a request for spell checker pls?